Welcome to Dark Dorset
Welcome to the Dark Dorset website - Dorset's premier website devoted to local folklore, customs, mysteries and the unexplained.
Based on the publication Dark Dorset: Tales of Mystery, Wonder and Terror by Robert. J. Newland and Mark. J. North. and Dark Dorset Calendar Customs by Robert. J. Newland. This site is an online compendium of information relating to local folklore and mysteries that can be discovered in the county of Dorset.
Click on the menu on the left of your screen to explore the wonderful world of Dark Dorset.
The site is regularly updated, so I do hope that you come back soon!
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Summer Is Icumen! - June
- Honouring a Dorset Saint: St. Wite's Day
The 1st June is the feast day of ‘St Wite’ (white) or as she was known in Latin ‘St Candida’. Very little is known about her except that her shrine at Whitchurch Canonicorum was and still is a place of pilgrimage. She was probably either a Celtic or Saxon holy woman who according to one legend was killed by Vikings when they raided Charmouth in 831AD. Part of this tradition is persevered in carvings on the church tower in the form of a Viking axe and longship, the agents of her death.
Click Here to find out more about this saint and her shrine at Whitchurch Canonicorum
- Happy Birthday! Thomas Hardy
Dorset writer and poet Thomas Hardy was born on 2nd June, 1840, at Higher Bockhampton, a hamlet in the parish of Stinsford, some two and half miles east of Dorchester.
- Midsummer Madness and the arrival of the Black Death to England
Midsummer Eve’ or ‘St John’s Eve’ falls on 23rd June and like Hallowe’en and St Mark’s Eve this is a time when ghosts, phantoms and fairies are believed to be abroad and when one can foretell the future. It was also this time in the month over 600 years ago that the dreadful plague known as the Black Death swept into from Asia claiming a third of Europe's population in just two years. Its arrival to England through Weymouth on the 25th June 1348.
Click Here to find out more about this dark day in history
- The Filly Loo
The Filly Loo at Ashmore, near Shaftesbury, a great annual free event outdoors around the village pond. The festival has been traditionally held on the Friday evening nearest to the Feast of St. John the Baptist or Midsummer's Day - 24th June, when villagers dance beside this singular village pond. Starts at around 7.30pm when The Hambledon Hopstep Band play and call from a cart decorated in greenery to the crowd, dancing in the street.
Click Here to find out more about this annual custom
- Ghostly Going's On in Beaminster
On 27th June 1728, school boys who attended the church of St. Mary's, Beaminster for schooling. Witnessed the apparition of the former pupil John Daniels, who was murdered in suspicious circumstances, a month earlier nearby his home.
Click here to read the full account of this 18th Century Ghost Story
The Dorsetarian
The Dorsetarian is an online journal featuring a selection of articles and stories on local folklore, mysteries and the unexplained submitted by visitors to this website.
Recent contributions include:-
- Folklore, Customs and Ghost Stories in Sherborne - Elisabeth Bletsoe of Sherborne Museum explores the folklore, customs and hauntings of this ancient Dorset market town.
- Well Dressing and Sacred Water - Dorset Archaeologist Chris Tripp, looks at the folk customs and traditions associated with water and how these ancient rituals still remain with us to this day.
- Folklore of William Barnes - We revisit an early article from the 1920s written by local Folklorist and Historian, John Symonds Udal. He discusses folklore of the county and how it influenced the writings and poetry of Dorset dialectologist Rev. William Barnes.
- Cerne Abbas - A brief history of the village with local Legends and Customs.
- Sea Dragons, Fairy Loaves & Serpents of Stone - Dr. Karl Shuker explores the folklore and proto-scientific beliefs attached to Lyme Regis's most famous fossils.
- Daisy Wheels and a Ritual Landscape in Dorset - Ric Kemp examines the strange, centuries-old religious symbols and carvings which can be found in churches in and around Dorset.
Reviews
Haunted Weymouth by Alex Woodward
Drawing on historical and contemporary sources, 'Haunted Weymouth' by local ghost tour guide Alex Woodward, is sure to send a shiver down the spine of anyone daring to learn more about the haunted history of the area. Including many previously unpublished stories, this book will appeal to both serious ghost hunters and those who simply want to discover what frights lurk beneath the surface of this once royal seaside resort.
The Recollections of Rifleman Harris Audio CD Read by Jason Salkey
The Recollections of Rifleman Harris Audio CD is abridged from an 1848 first edition of this famous historical memoir of a Rifleman Benjamin Randell Harris, from the 95th Rifles, in the Napoleonic Wars. This CD production by Explore Multimedia is read by Jason Salkey, who played the character of ‘Rifleman Harris’ in the Sharpe TV Series and provides a brilliant complement to his Harris diaries DVD series. Sound FX are provided by The 95th Rifles Re-enactment Society. A musical score by Adam Wakeman adds to this excellent production.
Shock! The Black Dog of Bungay: A Case Study in Folklore by Dr. David Waldron and Christopher Reeve
The tale of the Black Dog of Bungay and the infamous attack on the church of St. Marys in 1577, has inspired and fascinated residents and visitors to the town for centuries along with tales of Black Shuck the Ghostly Dog of Norfolk.
To this day, sightings of the Black Dog are common through the region and form an integral part of local folklore and myth. At the same time, the history of the legend itself tells its own tale of the town of Bungay and how the community has responded to crisis through local folklore and myth.
This book, a collaborative effort between local historian Christopher Reeve and historian and anthropologist Dr. David Waldron, traces the rise of this story from its origins in the trauma of the English Reformation to the contemporary era where it has become a central part of Bungay’s communal and civic identity and a colourful and intriguing aspect of local folklore.
Ghost Walks
If you are looking for something different this year, then ghost tours can provide some great entertainment, especially if they're ghost tours after dark. With Dorset having a lot of ghosts, it stands that there will be quite a number of ghost tours and haunted walks to be enjoyed.
We have gathered a collection of haunted walks, some permanent, some seasonal, which you can investigate.
PLEASE NOTE - Most of these guided ghost tours will require booking - and because of the nature of these ghost tours you should always at least contact the organisers (as they are NOT organised by Dark Dorset) to ensure there have been no changes to the plans as changes can occur at any time for many reasons.